


give your immortality to me

by cosmicpoet



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Chapter Two, Short Hair Maki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-08
Updated: 2018-06-08
Packaged: 2019-05-19 21:40:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14881715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmicpoet/pseuds/cosmicpoet
Summary: Maki wants to get rid of the illusion of power that everyone thinks she has, after her true talent has been revealed.





	give your immortality to me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [criischan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/criischan/gifts).



Maki stares at herself in the mirror, her fists clenched in familiar poise; there’s a knife on the dresser, familiar, as if this exact knife was born for this exact moment and has never moved from its place in the universe until now, when Maki picks it up. Overcome by memories of the cool hilt against her flesh, back when youth was snatched from her and has yet to return, she almost drops the metal back against the dresser, enamoured with the thought of everything shattering.

But she cannot remove the mirror, because she needs to stare at herself until her eyes are clear of tears. Here, in this academy, she has never felt more powerless than she does now. Trained to kill, and taunted with rules that say she mustn’t, all the while feeling alienated from the rest of them now that they know who she is. She’s just a vessel, through which the universe can complete its own killing, and now, without purpose, she’s stuck. All she wants to do is take back some of the control she’s been yearning for since childhood.

If there’s anyone she feels she can relate to, it’s Kaito. At least, in terms of her viewing herself as a vessel, she has a suspicion that he does the same, but the similarities stop there. Whilst she is a vessel for killing, he just uses the hollow bones of his body to allow other people to worm their way in and improve themselves through him. She thinks it’s vile, how they’ll all inevitably use him, become better, and leave him discarded. Understandable, a little empathetic, but she cannot get close to him.

Even if he has been outside of her door for an hour now, begging her to come outside. He promises her, his voice thick with falsity, that if she just lets him bring her to the others, they won’t judge her. Pathetic. Of course they’ll judge her – she’s built to be judged. Ultimate Assassin…a title fit for one who’s so used to clasping a knife. Her death will come soon, she’s sure of it, no matter how much that optimistic idiot promises to protect her from judgement and hatred; she’s got a target emblazoned on her chest now, and she isn’t doing anything about it.

Because they all view her as having power. They think that having an assassin within them imbalances the scales, and it does, but not in the way that they think. Whilst she’s viewed as terrifying, trained to kill, she’s just a scared girl at the end of the day, never having had a chance to grow up and learn how to be normal. So, when the scales are tipped, they’re not done so in her favour. Everyone else can team up, target her – she wishes that they’d just do it already, kill her, and it would all be over. It’s easier to exist under the assumption that everyone hates her and wants her dead.

Which is why Kaito, outside her door, has been so…difficult. Different.

Still, if they want her to be powerless, and they refuse to believe that she already is, then she’ll have to do something to prove to them that she isn’t the murderous caricature that they’ve been told she is. Remembering stories of Samson from childhood, and how power is derived from uncut hair, she weaves her hands between each long, dark strand, grasping them in her fist.

Holding the knife, so achingly familiar, she places it against her own hair, hesitating at first. But when she sees her reflection, with her eyes so broken and face trying to remain stoic, even in the solitude of her own mind, she feels anger burst from her fingertips. Hacking, chopping, cutting; large clumps of hair fall onto her skirt and the dresser table. She loves seeing parts of herself fall away from her body, and she doesn’t stop until she glances at her reflection and sees her shoulders exposed.

She can’t stop thinking of how ugly she is. How her hair is a mess, some long and some ridiculously short; in examining her mirror-self, she sees that she’s been crying. Reality overcomes her once more, and she hears Kaito’s voice from outside.

“You okay in there, Maki Roll?”

 _Damn him._ Damn him for _caring._ Damn him for _hearing._ Just…damn him for being outside. She has to get him to realise that she’s a monster, just like they think she is. It’ll be so much easier once she can get him to fall in line with the others and hate her – once everyone is against her, she’ll be able to reconcile herself with her place in this worthless, fragile universe. And with her hair in this state, and her eyes bloodshot and wild, she feels like she can finally scare him off.

So she opens the door.

“Fuck off,” she says.

He’s taken aback – she can see that in his expression, but he doesn’t back away. Instead, he steps towards her until he’s in her room, and she’s too surprised to even stop him.

“Maki Roll,” he says, “what did you do?”

“I fucking cut my hair.”

“I…can see that. But why are you crying?”

“Because this is who I am, Kaito. Ugly and scared, and I need you to hate me like the rest of them do. You’re pathetic…believing in me with your completely unfounded optimism. Just go away.”

“No.”

“What?”

“I said no. ‘Cause I don’t think this is the real you.”

“Well, it is. Sorry to fucking disappoint.”

“It’s not. I believe you’re scared, but not ugly or terrifying like you’re trying to frame yourself as.”

“I’m not _trying_ to frame myself as anything.”

“Yeah, I get it. It’s Kokichi, right? He had no right to tell everyone about your talent.”

“I don’t care. Because it _is_ my talent, and that’s fact.”

“Right, yeah. But you haven’t killed anyone in here. Fuck, before all this got revealed, you probably could have killed someone and gotten away with it, ‘cause nobody knew about your talent. But you didn’t. That proves to me that you’re a good person.”

“O-Oh,” she says, quietly, slightly taken aback.

“C’mon, I think you’d really suit short hair. We just need to cut off the rest of these long bits.”

“W-We?”

“Yeah, we. Me and you. You got any scissors around here?” Kaito asks.

“Yeah, uh, in my drawer.”

Kaito takes the scissors and sits her down in front of the dresser. She’s silent, stunned by his quiet compassion as he softly moves her hair behind her ears and starts to slowly cut away at the longer strands, with far more composure and sweetness than she treated herself with only moments ago.

She closes her eyes, letting herself feel the warmth of his hands brushing against her neck, until he taps her lightly on the shoulder. When she looks in the mirror, she almost doesn’t recognise herself. Her hair is smooth, and recognisable, although different to how she’s ever seen herself in the past – she sees him smiling in the mirror, and her face softens in mild comfort.

“See?” Kaito says.

“See what?”

“Yourself.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed this! I wrote this for the wonderful [@Cruuuuuuus](https://twitter.com/Cruuuuuuus) on twitter, who drew a wonderful short-hair Maki comic! Check out the amazing art that inspired this fic [here](https://twitter.com/Cruuuuuuus/status/1005115416778338304)!
> 
> Title from 'Wine Red' by The Hush Sound. I was listening to it whilst writing this and thought of how momoharu it is!


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